Give it a Try
by Kenjiro Minami
Summary: Secret Santa gift for meh friend Stormy.


"What do you _mean_ you're pregnant?" The six foot man ran his hands through his jet black hair as he paced the living room in front of his wife. "The last time we had sex was two and a half months ago, and that was because... because... Well, there was a reason we had it, but I don't remember it! _Please_ tell me it's not _my_ child!" He begged.

His wife frowned, her green eyes portraying annoyance as she ran a hand through her auburn hair. "Nesia, you know I'd never do that to you."

"But you know how much kids terrify me!" The man, Nesia, exclaimed. " _Please_! It _can't_ be mine! Adira, at this point, I'd be one _hundred_ , one _thousand_ percent okay with it if you had cheated on me. _Please_! Don't say it's mine!"

"Nesia Hunterson, the child is yours, and that's final. No 'if''s 'and's or 'but''s about it. It's yours and mine. I was just as frightened as you when I missed my cycle _twice_ , that means _two months_ I've missed my cycle, _Nesia_ , but now I've stood up and faced it. And you should do the same, because there is _no way_ I'm going in for an abortion, which I know is why you have your mouth hanging open like that."

Nesia immediately clamped his mouth shut. He ran a hand through his hair once more, letting out a high-pitched whimper as he bit his lip, too. "I-I think I'm going to go talk to Ben about this. Can I go talk to Ben, please?"

Adira sighed and nodded. "Yes, Nesia. You may go speak with Ben."

"Thank you." He rushed over to Adira and brought her into a suffocating hug. "I'll be back. I promise you, I'll be back. This will _not_ be something I'm running away from. I promise you that." He gave Adira's forehead a small kiss before he released his wife from the suffocating hug he had her in and rushing to the door, leaving her smiling behind him as her husband left to speak to the only long-time friend he had.

Adira looked down at her stomach and rubbed it softly, still smiling. "He's going to be an amazing father," she murmured to both herself and the child growing inside her. "Once he stops doubting himself, he's going to be the best father he can possibly be. He just needs to stop being afraid. Just you wait and see. You're going to love your father. I just know you will."

Sighing, Adira laid down on the couch, but not before grabbing the television remote from the coffee table in front of her. Switching on the television, she watched a random program as she awaited her husbands return.

.·•·°·•·°·•·.

An hour later, Nesia was panting at the doorstep of his friend's house. The demigod waited until he had caught his breath before reaching up a hand and knocking on the door. He waited a couple tense minutes for a response, but there was none. He double checked the driveway for Ben's car, and when he saw it was there, he knocked again, this time louder. He waited a couple more minutes, and, finally, he heard someone thudding down the stairs of the house. Nesia waited impatiently for Ben to open the door, and when he finally did, he stopped short when he saw his friend topless and hair a disheveled mess. He was panting, clearly having been rushed to get his lower half dressed so he could answer the door.

Nesia stared at Ben for a few minutes, trying to piece together what he was seeing. "You... you don't... Uh... Where's...?" He gestured to Ben's bare chest, unable to form proper words to ask the question he was trying to ask, and the other demigod turned a bit red.

"Ah... you sort of caught us at a bad time, Nes..." He admitted, rubbing the back of his neck a bit sheepishly.

"Oh... I can... ah... _leave_ and come back later...?" The son of Achlys didn't mean to say it as a question, but the situation was a little more awkward than he would have liked, so it came out that way.

The son of Hephaestus quickly shook his head. "No, no. You don't have to go." Ben looked outside and around his home for a car that wasn't usually there, but when he didn't find one, he frowned slightly. "Especially since it appears you walked... Really, Nesia, you need to learn how to drive. So, don't go." The way he was speaking quickly was clear to the demigod that Ben was nervous or upset to be "caught in the act". "We were just finishing up, anyways... Agh..." He rubbed his face. "Gods, this is awkward..."

Nesia scoffed. "You're telling _me_. I came over to ask for advice because we're apparently expecting, and here you are having your own _se_ -"

"Wait wait wait wait wait," Ben said quickly, cutting Nesia off. The son of Achlys scowled at his friend, knowing that Ben knew that he didn't like to be cut off. But the son of Hephaestus clearly didn't care. "You and Adira... you two are having a _child_?"

Nesia nodded in affirmation, and Ben grinned before pulling his friend into an unexpected hug.

"Gods, I'm so _proud_ of you, Nes!" Ben exclaimed as he tried to crush his friends ribs. "Finally facing your fear of being a father. Gods, how much you've _grown_!"

The son of Achlys let out a wheeze. "Benjamin... Too... tight..."

The son of Hephaestus chuckled and released Nesia from the bone-crushing hug he had had him in. "I'm just so proud of you. Aithne and I have been trying for a _year_ now, and here you are, expecting your own little child!"

Nesia sighed. "I didn't mean to. I really didn't mean to. I didn't _want_ this, Ben. I didn't _want_ to be a father. I fear that I might end up like my own."

"That's _nonesense_ , Nesia. There is no _way_ in _hell_ that you'd end up like your father. You're too kind, thoughtful, and just the _right_ amount of rough that you're going to be an _excellent_ father." He gripped his friends shoulders and gave them a tight squeeze, smiling. "It'll just take time. That's all."

Nesia furrowed his black eyebrows. "Are you sure you're not gay?"

Ben laughed at that, and Nesia couldn't help but to smile. "I have a wife, N! And so do you! Stop trying to hook up with me."

"Oh, you'd probably be the last person I'd date if I were gay, too," Nesia said in a serious tone, though Ben knew he was joking.

Shaking his head, Ben cracked a wide smile. "You know you love me, Nesia. Stop denying it."

"I wish it weren't so."

The son of Hephaestus chuckled. He released Nesia's shoulders and stepped aside and out of the doorway. "Come in, my dear lover, and talk to me about your fears. Let's see if we can work them out before they come true."

"They're _coming_ true, Benjamin," Nesia argued as he stepped inside his friend's house. "That's why we need to talk about them as soon as possible."

"Pft." Ben walked into the kitchen and prepared to make some coffee. "Would you like some coffee?"

"You burn yours. No thanks."

"But burnt is the best way to go!"

Nesia raised an eyebrow. "You just don't know how to make coffee."

Ben stared back at Nesia for a couple of moments before switching off the coffee machine. "Touche, Nes." He sighed and looked sadly at the coffee. "Aithne always manages to make it perfectly, and I keep begging her to tell me her secret, but she just gives me this look an-"

"Is the look by chance the 'You're hopeless' look?" Nesia asked, hiding an amused smile and glad he wasn't the only one who thought that Ben was hopeless from time to time or constantly on any given activity he fails to excel in.

Ben nodded quickly, his brown eyes bugging. "That's _exactly_ the look she gives me! How'd you know?"

"Because that's the look I give you frequently," the son of Achlys responded. "That, and us men aren't of much use around the house, so we're pretty hopeless here. Luckily, I found myself a wife who's willing to teach me the stuff she does."

"Dude, we need to switch wives," Ben said as soon as Nesia finished talking. "Not only does yours teach you things, but you also seem to have better luck at getting a child than I do, too."

"Aithne wouldn't like that, you wouldn't like that, and there is no way I'm going to conceive an accidental child with anyone but Adira."

Ben faked a pout before grinning. "Always the one to stay loyal to your girl."

"You're loyal to yours, too."

"Yeah, I am, aren't I?"

Nesia nodded. "Like a dog."

That made Ben grin for some reason, but he didn't explain why. Instead, he simply said "perfect" before going silent for a couple of moments. "I'm going to go get dressed properly," he told Nesia, heading for the stairs. "Mind if I tell Aithne you're here? She may be able to give you a ride back home. She needs to leave for work in a couple of hours."

"I don't think I'm staying that long, but go ahead. I don't mind." He looked around at the walls, noticing some pictures that hadn't been there before. "Take all the time you need," he told Ben, walking up to one of the pictures and picking it up. "I'm just going to look around a bit while I wait."

The son of Hephaestus nodded. "Just don't go into the garage. I'm building something there, and it doesn't respond kindly to people that aren't me."

"Wait, what's in the- and he's gone..." Sighing, Nesia looked back at the photo in his hands. He looked over the face of Ben's younger mortal sister Annie and tried to memorize it. He'd only ever seen Ben's sister once in person, and that was because Nesia had went over to Ben's house needing a tool to fix something and she had been there. She hadn't been very pleasant, but the son of Achlys had liked that. He wasn't very pleasant, either, so they had become quick friends. Or... something along friend lines. Nesia wasn't quite sure what they were. Maybe friendly acquaintances. He didn't have many friends, so that was a good title for his relationship with Ben's sister Annie.

The son of Achlys glanced another photo with a red head in it, and he set down the one with Annie and walked over to it. He picked that one up, too, and looked at the red head standing next to Ben. At first he thought it was Aithne, Ben's wife, but when he saw no freckles under her eyes and the clear nine-inch height difference between the two people in the photo, Nesia knew immediately that it was Ben's other sister on his godly side, Askira Jones.

"Wait," Nesia muttered to himself. "Not Jones anymore... Black... I need to remember that..."

It was strange to see a smile on Askira's face in the photo, even after the years of knowing her. Rarely ever did the demigod smile in his presence, but when she did, it always seemed to make Ben and everyone who knew her happier. Nesia guessed it had something to do with her past, because he remembered, vaguely, Ben once telling him that Askira had ended up with a child at the age of fifteen. Nesia had only ever seen her not as a baby, since she was six, now, and was frequently over at Ben's house to visit her uncle.

Nesia smiled softly as he thought of Askira's daughter, Evangeline. Evangeline, or otherwise known as "Ava" or "Supreme King" (she liked the contradiction of it, considering she was a girl, saying that "King" held a title of power, and that it portrayed her as a strong woman instead of a "weak" queen). Every time she was over when Nesia came jogging up to the door, he would always find himself in a game of tag, and he would actually laugh. Ava wasn't a child that he was afraid of accidentally stepping on, because she wasn't afraid of him stepping on her. When he did, she'd laugh it off, telling him it was okay and that she was stronger than she looked. And she was. She was a strong little girl, and she treated Nesia like family.

 _Maybe... Since I can play with Ava without fear... being a father will be much easier than I'm making it out to be_ , Nesia thought with a small smile, setting down the photo. He glanced up at the stairs when he started to hear talking, and headed to the door, deciding to just head home. "Hey, Ben?" Nesia called up the stairs.

The talking ceased, and Ben popped his head over the stairs Nesia was looking up. "Yes?"

"I think I'm just going to head home, now," he told his friend. "I think I have everything pieced together, now."

"Aww... Well, be sure to visit again, yeah?"

The son of Achlys smiled and nodded. "Yeah, I'll visit. And I promise one of the visits is going to include the little one."

Ben's facial features adopted a wide grin. "Awesome. See you soon!" He disappeared back to his room where he had been talking with his wife.

Nesia smiled and opened the door, leaving Ben's house. He decided to just walk home, to give himself more time to think over the thought of becoming and _being_ a father. He managed to convince himself, as he walked, that if he was good with Evangeline, he'd be good with his own child. There was only a six year difference between Askira's daughter and his unborn child. What more could be different?

Nesia scoffed at himself. _A whole bunch, Nessi. A_ whole _bunch. You need to raise the child, too, you know._

Sighing, Nesia rubbed his face. "Gods. What have I gotten myself into?"

.·•·°·•·°·•·.

"Adira?" Nesia called into the house, closing the door behind himself. "I'm home." He looked around his home as he locked the door behind himself. The son of Achlys kicked off his shoes and bent down, picking them up, his feet sock-less beneath as a habit from when he was younger, during the times he had lived with his father, who had never allowed him socks. "Adira?" Nesia called into the house once more. "Are you here?"

Still he got no response, and the son of Achlys wandered away from the door after a while. He approached the kitchen and poked his head in, wondering if his wife was preparing dinner, but when he didn't see her there, his brows furrowed. Retreating from the kitchen, he began searching the other rooms of the small house, both upstairs and down. When he still couldn't find Adira, he headed back outside to see if their car was there. He frowned slightly when it wasn't parked up against the curb, ten feet from the red zone like it always was.

 _She must have gone to the store..._

Sighing, Nesia went back inside and raided the fridge for some rum. He stopped short when he saw a note on the door of it, hanging from a round gray magnet. Plucking the note off the fridge, Nesia read it.

 _Left to get some food. Be back for dinner. Your turn to make it!  
-Adira_

Nesia blinked and looked at the stove. _Me... cook..._ dinner _?_ He stared at the note for a few moments before looking back up at the stove. "You might be the reason this house goes up in flames, buddy," he grumbled to the stove. Sighing, he turned to the fridge again and opened it up, grabbing out the cold bottle of rum and a few other things, and began to mix himself a drink before he cooked. "If I'm going to burn tonight," he thought aloud, "then I might as well burn with a drink in my hand."

Finishing up mixing his drink, he put the things he used back where he had gotten them from. Picking up his drink from the counter, Nesia took a sip and began scavenging the cupboards for things to make dinner out of. Once he found a couple of things, he opened the freezer for some ice for his drink, and scowled.

"Of course there was already lasagna in here," he grumbled, reaching in and pulling out the family sized box of frozen lasagna. "Why wouldn't there be lasagna in here?" He set it on the counter and reached back into the freezer for his ice, and his scowl deepened when his hand met none where it should have been. "Guess I'm making ice, too."

Sighing, the son of Achlys closed the freezer door, preheated the oven, and headed over to the living room, deciding to skip out on making the ice, since they wouldn't need it for dinner. He went over to the couch and sat down, and began the wait for the oven to finish preheating, sipping his drink all the while and thinking.

.·•·°·•·°·•·.

"Nesia... Nesia... Come on, Nesia. Wake up."

"Too early..." the son of Achlys whined, rolling over on the couch. Adira's chuckle sounded in front of him after he rolled over, and he blinked open his eyes. Icy blue was met with forest green, one tired and the other wide awake.

"Hey, sleepy," Adira said, a small smile on her face. "You didn't burn dinner."

Nesia gave his wife a sleepy grin. "Yeah. I burnt my hand a little, though. But I'm fine," he quickly added when he saw Adira's worried expression. "I ran it under cold water like you taught me to do when I get a burn."

She smiled softly at that. "Glad something I've taught you finally got itself stuck in your thick skull."

Her husband chuckled at that. He sat up, yawning, and placed his feet on the floor in front of the couch. "Would you like to eat dinner now, or later...?"

"A bit later is fine with me," Adira responded, taking a seat beside him on the couch once the spot was cleared. "As long as you don't have to go to work soon."

Nesia shook his head. "No. The bar gave me a rotating shift this month. I work next Saturday."

Adira nodded. "Alright. Then let's wait a few minutes before we eat dinner."

"Sounds good," Nesia yawned.

The married couple was silent for a couple of minutes before Adira spoke up.

"Did you think over what I had told you?" The daughter of Ariadne asked.

Nesia wasn't prepared for the question, and he blinked. He took a couple of seconds to answer. "...Yes...?"

Adira furrowed her eyebrows. "Was that meant to come out as a question?"

Nesia shook his head. "N-no. I didn't mean for it to come out like that. Um... Yes... I did think over what you had said, and... I'm willing to give it a try. I-"

" _'A_ try'?" Adira repeated, interrupting Nesia. "Not _many_ tries? So if only one thing goes wrong, you're done trying? Nesia, you need to-"

"Let me finish? Yes, I agree. You do need to let me finish."

Adira clamped her mouth shut and sighed through her nose. Once Nesia was sure she wasn't going to interrupt him again, he continued.

"I'm willing to give it a try, Adira. A forever try. I'll try raising our child properly. I'll try and make _sure_ they don't end up bad, because they're going to be our child. I may be afraid of having a kid, but... hopefully that fear will make me raise them right."

Adira frowned slightly, and Nesia bit his lip as he waited for her to process what he had said. When she finally did, a small smile twitched at the edges of her mouth. "Thank you, Nesia."

The son of Achlys let out a sigh of relief when she accepted his words. He smiled softly. "Anything for you, Adira."

His wife gave him a small smile. "Come on," she said, getting up. "Let's go eat dinner and discuss over names for the baby, both boy and girl names."

 **...**

 **Boop. Crappy ending. X3**

 **Look! My first Adisia fic! :D Here's your Secret Santa gift, Stormy!**


End file.
